Press Release:

San Francisco, Calif. – May 16, 2011 – Elgato today released a dual network tuner that allows users to watch HDTV wirelessly on either a Mac or PC. HDHomeRun connects to a TV antenna or digital cable and wirelessly streams live television in full HD to any Mac or PC in the house.

Powered by technology from SiliconDust, Elgato’s HDHomeRun is a network dual tuner for HDTV. The tuner works seamlessly on multiple computers. One person can watch and record TV on a Mac, and at the same time a second person can watch and record a different channel on a PC. HDHomeRun connects to your existing TV antenna or cable TV outlet, and to your router via Ethernet. This allows the device to remain concealed in a discreet location away from your computers. Once connected to your Wi-Fi network, users can watch live TV wirelessly on a portable computer or iPad, anywhere inside the house.

“This new platform satisfies two requests that many of our customers have made: viewing of HDTV content on multiple household computers and inconspicuous placement of the device itself,” said Adam Steinberg, Elgato’s VP of Marketing. “HDHomeRun is designed to give our customers maximum flexibility. Whether it’s Mac or PC, capturing a TV signal from either an antennae or cable or being able to view and record different content on
multiple computers, HDHomeRun can accomplish it all.”

HDHomeRun comes with EyeTV 3, the award-winning TV software for Mac. Watch, pause, and rewind live TV on your Mac. Search the Program Guide, record TV shows, and export recordings to iTunes automatically for playback on an iPhone or iPad. HDHomeRun is compatible for use on a PC; it works great with Windows 7 Media Center.

Elgato’s HDHomeRun solution paired with the EyeTV app enables streaming of live and recorded TV to an iPhone, iPod, and iPad via 3G. However, this is only available when using a Mac and is not available for PC.

HDHomeRun is currently available from the Elgato Store, Amazon, B&H Photo and the Apple Store at a price of $179.95.

What’s in the Box

HDHomeRun Network Dual Tuner for HDTV
EyeTV 3 software for Mac (CD-ROM)
Driver for Microsoft Windows 7 Media Center (CD-ROM)
Ethernet cable
Power Supply
PDF Product Manual (CD-ROM)
Quick Start Guide

System Requirements

Macintosh: Intel Core 2 Duo CPU, Mac OS X v10.5.8 or later
PC: Windows 7, 2.0 GHz Intel Core 2 Duo/AMD CPU
1 GB RAM
Home network with 100Base-T Ethernet (802.11n 5GHz for wireless)
For more information about Elgato’s HDHomeRun, please contact PR representative Brian Metcalf (brianmetcalf@maxborgesagency.com).

About Elgato:

Elgato  produces award-winning TV software together with a complete range of TV tuners and capture devices to watch, record, and edit TV and HDTV on Macs and PCs. Elgato is the home of EyeTV, the world’s leading television solution for Mac computers. Elgato also produces a variety of world-class H.264 video conversion and streaming products. Elgato
is privately held with offices in Munich, Germany and San Francisco, California.

No doubt you have seen it and read reviews about it.  Instead of boring you with the usual review my goal is to setup the Boxee Box and test it with Windows Home Server.  Pretty Simple.  What you will see here is a whole lot of un-professional photos of the actual screens and not a whole lot of stock photo screens.  Let’s get busy.

Quick and Dirty History of Boxee Box

First there was software.  You can make your own Boxee Box with free software and a free iOS app for a remote.

Next came the Box.  At first it was going to be based on the NVIDIA Tegra 2 chip but it had issues with HD playback.

Boxee Box hit the shelves November 10th, 2010 with the Intel Atom chipset.  Two weeks later it got it’s first update. And another, and so on.  A huge update landed January 19th.  It’s the reason for the delay of this article.

An iPad app is also due out for it soon.  It will allow you to stream content to the iPad which sounds pretty cool.

Here is what you get.

• Double-sided remote control
• HDMI out (HDCP, cable included)
• Ethernet Port
• 802.11n Wireless
• 2 USB 2.0 ports
• Optical Digital Audio (S/PDIF)
• Composite Audio Connectors
• AC Power Connector

How about some blurry un-boxing pics?

If you just glanced by the contents it does come with an HDMI cable which I thought was awesome.  I didn’t have to go digging around for one.

I chose Windows Home Server for a reason.  Protect my stuff, play back my stuff.  I have tons of photos, music, movies, and videos stored on my WHS.  I’m also a media center user so I have recorded TV on the server as well.  I am more interested in playing my stuff rather than Internet content.  This article will be heavily slanted in that direction.

I know you have probably seen it before but the Boxee Box will play almost anything you can throw at it.  Here is a quick rundown of the formats supported.

Video Formats

Boxee supports Adobe Flash 10.1, FLV/On2 VP6 (FLV/FV4/M4V), H.264 AVC (TS/AVI/MKV/MOV/M2TS/MP4),

VC-1 (TS/AVI/MKV/WMV), MPEG-1 (DAT/MPG/MPEG), MPEG-2 (MPG/MPEG/VOB/TS/TP/ISO/IFO),

MPEG-4 (MP4/AVI/MOV), DivX 3/4/5/6 (AVI/MKV), Xvid (AVI/MKV), and WMV9 (WMV/ASF/DVR-MS).

Audio Formats

Boxee supports MP3, WAV/PCM/LPCM, WMA, AIF/AIFF, AC3/AAC, OGG, FLAC, DTS, and Dolby Digital/Dolby True HD

Image Formats

Boxee supports JPEG, PNG, GIF, BMP, TIFF.

Another shot of the back panel.

My initial test environment was a crappy 19”, 720p TV.  It sits by my desk and allows me to test stuff while being close to a computer and an Ethernet connection.  It’s a horrible TV actually.  Lesson 1.  The Boxee Box cannot make a bad TV look better.  While I was putting it through it’s paces the January 19th update landed.  It changed everything about the Boxee Box in my opinion.  Lesson 2.  Well, there is no lesson 2.  I just wished I would have had the update before I started.

Setup

Getting the Boxee Box up and running is a breeze.

Boxee booted up and detected an upgrade.  Downloaded it, rebooted, installed it, Rebooted again.

It all happened fairly quick.  It will guide you through screen alignment and setup of your user account.  Yes, you have to create an account to use it.  They claim it’s because of it’s “social” abilities.  Unfortunately, you have to validate your new account via e-mail so if your at your TV doing this you have to fetch a computer.  While your at the Boxee site you can setup your social networks if you want to.

I setup Twitter and it allows me to watch video that anyone tweets about.  I guess that’s cool.  Facebook is much the same but more content rich.  Again, setup seemed easy and intuitive.  The mini keyboard on the back of the remote was super handy during the process.

Prior to it’s first update.

After the update.  Not quite as nice looking if you ask me.

Startup Time

Startup time was 1 Minute 7 Seconds until you can use the remote.  A few seconds more for it to load thumbs on the home screen.

When do I get to watch my stuff?

The interface is very easy to understand so the first thing I did was add media locations on my network.  The Boxee Box will see everything on your network that is capable of sending it video, photos, or music.

Click, add, done.  Boxee Box will then index these locations and fetch all the items.  This will take some time to do initially.  The WHS user will be able to find your media shares very easily.  In the menus of Boxee you simply go to files and it will list all the shares you previously added.  When navigating these shares you can do it by a list or by thumbnail.  If you have done anything with streaming movies to Media Center you will have cover-art on the Boxee just as you do on Media Center.  I use MyMovies to manage my DVD collection and the Boxee used the cover art perfectly.

Before we start playback of media let’s go back to that January update again.  Prior to this update I was having a lot of buffering issues.  I was using an Ethernet connection and not the wireless.  Playback of Blu-Ray content was practically useless.  It buffered, played, buffered played.  I was sad for the little Boxee Box.  I was going to give it some bad marks.  Let me tell you, this last update changed everything. What an improvement on Blu-Ray rips!  I am streaming perfectly from the WHS and even have a file copy operation going on with the server along with an RDP active.  Resume time is fast and start up buffering is hardly noticeable now.

The Media I consume

I stream a lot of ripped DVD’s and watch media captured by a Canon HG-10 HD camera and various Canon point and shoots.  That means a lot of MTS HD files from the HD camera and AVI’s shot with the smaller ones.  I also record content with Media Center and convert it to MP4 automatically in order to make it mobile.  There are many reviews of what this box can handle and they are not hard to find.  I tried to stay away from other reviews and concentrate on what I could throw at it and what it would handle.  Here is what I found.

Media Center

.wtv plays fine.  Forget about fast forwarding though.  It’s not a smooth process and would often pause the playback where you couldn’t continue watching.  Also, if your media is not named in a fashion where you can tell the particular episode number of the file you want to watch it could also be frustrating to sort through.  I have heard that the Boxee will somehow scrape TV shows for meta information but I wasn’t able to figure that one out.

One of my .wtv files that plays just fine on an extender and a Media Center HTPC stopped playback at the 22 minute mark everytime I tested it.

.dvr-ms Recorded natively to dvr-ms played.  Conversion from .wtv to .dvr-ms stuttered and was not watchable.  Occasionally these high bitrate .dvr-ms file would buffer.  It seemed it would buffer more the longer you got into the movie.  The buffer period was about 2 to 3 seconds with another second of waiting for it to play.  Test file was Ice Age movie recorded in HD off of Fox.  I would call this unwatchable.  *Note* I tried to look at the bitrate in the meta tags of this file and it was reporting a VERY large bitrate.  So large that I don’t think it’s correct.  It plays fine on the XBox360 as a Media Center Extender so that leads me to believe the meta is incorrect.  These files also seemed to agitate the Boxee.  It wouldn’t play anything else with confidence after struggling with the dvr-ms.  It had to be rebooted.

.mp4 files converted from dvr-ms played fine.  These files were easy for Boxee at around 1300kbps bitrate.

Ripped DVD’s to video_ts folders looked fine.  If you ripped with menus you will get them on the Boxee.

Blu-Ray Rip, Harry Potter 6 at 23,717kbps bitrate played great and of course looked fantastic.  Boxee does not disappoint here.

Another Blu-Ray rip that was a combined 39,128kbs bitrate struggled to stream from Windows Home Server.  This could be due to network or activity on the server but I tried it several times during several different portions of the day.  Still struggled.  When the rip was copied to the external drive it had no issues.

.avi files played but would frequently experience audio cutouts

.wmv files converted AVI files from canon camera.  Starts ok, but goes into slow motion with audio cutting in and out 9800 bitrate.  Could just be my conversion causing it.

Movies tab in Boxee plays nicely with my DVDdirectory.  Cover art looks good.

.MTS played fine bitrate was 15528

.m2ts played fine bitrate was 15628

.mov from an iPhone 4 played great

.3gp from a Droid Incredible did not play.  Audio did, but not video.

The higher bitrate Blu-Ray that struggled.

Notes on playback testing:

Why would I have a .wtv file converted to dvr-ms?  I use MCE Buddy and it converts files to dvr-ms first in order to then convert them to MP4.

Notice I didn’t test a lot of different audio setups.

Attaching a hard drive

It’s pretty simple to do it.  Power it off, plug it in, reboot.  Browse files.  You can see in the photos that I tested some of my media files via the hard instead of streaming.

Any changes in file testing?  AVI still sluggish, .3gp still no video.  DVD’s were fine.  Higher bitrate Blu-Ray rip played perfectly.

The remote

Much has been said about the Boxee Box remote.  It is very nice.  Limited but nice.  I always seemed to pick it up the wrong way meaning, I had it upside down.  You learn it fast though since there are so few buttons!  The best part of the remote is what’s on the underside of it.  It’s a chiclet style keyboard that helps a ton during setup and will also be used for apps and web content with the Boxee.  If you have a ton of content it also makes it easy for searching.  The remote is a joy to use due to it’s simplicity.

Video Podcasts

One thing I really liked about the Boxee was playing video podcasts.  I don’t need to spend a lot of time on it.  It plays them.

Boxee Box is Social

When you add your Facebook, Twitter account, etc. you are open to a whole new set of content.  I thought that was one cool aspect of the Boxee.  Twitter posts that referenced videos were in my friends feed and I could view them right on the Boxee.

Apps

If you are into online media Boxee Box has a few apps to feed your habit.  At the time of review the Netflix app was still non-existent but still promised.  Hulu as well.  I tried out the RSS feeds app and was able to add a feed and view web posts and listen to podcasts.  If the post had a media file attached like a podcast post will it automatically starts playing instead of loading the post in a browser.  It would have been really cool had there been a Play-On and an Amazon VOD app.

The Home Server Show Feed

The Wrap-Up

One thing I can say about this review is it was time consuming due to my bad habit of starting to test the Boxee Box and ending up watching the content as entertainment rather than scrutinizing the Boxee’s ability.  I spent a lot of time going through old movies and getting caught up in the media instead of moving on to the next thing on my list.  I guess that is a good thing for the Boxee but it did eat up a lot of time!

I didn’t break down the door here with tons of testing although this review took weeks!  I tested my content and I assume a lot of WHS and Media Center users will have similar.  If you have a file type you would like tested use the contact box on this blog and I’ll see what I can do.

Is this a Media Center or HTPC replacement?  No, I don’t think so.  Is it better than the other streamers that are on the market?   I’ve read a lot about them and due to it’s balance of online and personal content I think it is but I haven’t tested the others so don’t take my word for it.   I also think it could be a good compliment system to a HTPC if you like it’s features.  Why not?

So really, can it replace your HTPC?  That all depends on your consumption.  If you like your live TV then forget about it.  This Boxee is not for you.  Playback of recorded TV although somewhat fussy at times does work.  Apps and online content are great with more to come from Boxee.  If you are social and into online content more than TV this is an awesome solution.  It has a good balance of playing your own content as well as online content.  I am also assuming from their last update that more updates will come and the Boxee Box will continue to improve.  It should be an easy call for you based on the bold items in this paragraph.  If it doesn’t fit you now there is a good chance it might in the future so keep an eye on it.

Boxee Box Home page

$199.00 at Amazon.com

A forums topic has been setup for discussion of this review or if you have comments and questions.  Go here.

This is another post in the WHS-101 Series.

Connect Windows Media Center with WHS

When you launch Windows Media Center you’ve probably seen the following message pop up letting you know that you can connect Media Center to WHS. When you click OK, it doesn’t install anything, it’s just a reminder.

You’ll need to Open the Start Menu in Windows 7, All Programs, and select Windows Media Center Connector.

This will launch the Connector Setup wizard to walk you through the setup process.

Enter in your WHS password.

That’s it! Then a restart is required to complete the process.

Using Media Center with WHS

After you come back from the restart, open Windows Media Center and you’ll find Home Server as an option in the main menu. You have two choices, either TV Archive or Console view.

First we’ll take a look at the TV Archive feature. This will show the activity of your Live TV recordings. You’ll get a list of shows that have been recorded and successfully archived or if the archive failed. You can sort by status, title, or clear the history.

It also allows you to compress the recorded TV to work on your various portable devices like Zune, Windows Mobile, and the original resolution.

Unless you’ve changed the settings, TV that you’ve recorded should be in the Recorded TV library folder, which pulls the shows from your server.

Select Recorded TV to check out the shows you’ve recorded.

Console View

Console View is essentially a light read-only overview of your server. From here you can see server storage space, drives, shared folders, health, media counts, and backups. You can’t directly control anything on your server from here, but if you’re watching a movie or TV and want an quick look at some server information, it’s easy and intuitive to use.

If you’re using Windows Home Server Version 1 with Power Pack 3, this should get you started with connecting Windows Media Center with your WHS. This is a basic feature with WHS and there are more complex setups you can do with other Add-Ins that we’ll be taking a look at it the future.

What about you guys? Do you use the Windows Media Center Connector with WHS? Leave a comment and let us know!

This is another post in the WHS – 101 Series. If you have questions or want to discuss it further head to the Home Server Show Forums.

I know you are familiar with the HD HomeRun network tuner.  AverMedia showed us their dual tuner network device complete with iPad and iPhone app tonight at ShowStoppers CES 2011.  It was a demo without the live TV feed but we got the basic feel for it.  The iPad app had the ability to change channels with a swipe to the left or right or you could bring up the EPG and menu settings.

I have a couple of videos showing the tuner in action.

The quality is not that great so I apologize for that.  This product is supposed to hit the market in May 2011 and it’s unknown at what price point.

Our very own Jim Collison is on Ian’s podcast this week.  Check out The Media Center Show here.

This week on The Media Center Show I am talking to Windows Home Server and Windows Media Center enthusiast Jim Collison about Windows Home Server Vail, Windows Home Server addins and using WHS and Windows Media Center together.

Network basics/recommendations

There is an abundance of information on networking on the internet, as well as on this site so I will not go into “how” but rather some recommendations based on my own experiences and opinions.

Wireless Networking – Photos, Standard Definition movies, Music, and general file access. Will not stream uncompressed HD content (20 Mbit/sec or higher). Usually cannot handle multiple simultaneous streams of any content. I would recommend using 5 Gighz devices for movie streaming.

Power line Networking – Photos, Standard Definition movies, Music, and general file access. Will typically not stream uncompressed HD content (20 Mbit/sec or higher). Usually cannot handle too many simultaneous streams. Dependant on house wiring and the condition of the wiring. Most installations I have tried for movie streaming have been problematic.

Hardwire Cat 5/5e (10/100) – Ideal for HD, SD, photos playback. Works well for uncompressed HD but usually only on one stream at a time. Not recommended for large file copies such as uncompressed HD due to bandwidth performance.

Hardwire Cat 5e/6 (1 gigabit) – Any content. Can handle 2-3 HD streams simultaneously (depending of bit rate and your equipment) in addition to some SD content. Ideal for handling blu ray playback especially if streaming to multiple locations. Ideal for direct copying to your WHS.

Windows Media Center (Standard Definition Content)

Let’s say that you have one or two computers, a Windows Home Server, and want to stream standard DVD’s to Windows Media Center PC. WMC natively will support many different formats and does an excellent job reading the native folder structure found on DVD’s perfectly (Video_TS\*.VOB). Effectively all you have to do is get your content using your favorite cloning software to a WHS Share folder and make sure that the folder is set up in the library of your Windows Media Center and you are good to go. Using the “list view” in WMC, you should now be able to see all the movies you added in as well as being able to play your content without any additional hardware or software. This method should provide full menu and chapter support as well as all the available sound tracks and subtitles assuming they are contained.

Hardware: Any PC windows suitable for running windows 7

Software: No additional software required.

Recommended Formats: DVD Folder structure (VOB Files, native format)

Windows Media Center (HD content)

Things get a little more interesting when trying to play HD content as it is not directly supported by Windows Media Center. One of the best ways I have found to playback all HD content is to use TMT 3 (Total Media Theatre 3). It supports virtually every kind of HD video including the AVCHD format from your HD camcorder. The only container type it will not support at this time is MKV so you would require a third party add-in or codec pack to make this work. My luck and experiences with third party codecs have not been great so I highly recommend “not” using them. It is better to stick to mainstream software for overall better compatibility. TMT 3 is a very solid product and integrates well into Windows Media Center. Once you have copied your content to a share folder in WHS (such as \server\HD Content) and added it to WMC, you should be able to playback your HD content of your choice (except of course MKV) much the same way you did with standard DVD’s. Displaying your movie titles in Media Center will be seamless and will co-exist with standard DVD, home movies, and other content which makes it easier to view when everything is located in on one screen.

Hardware: Any Windows PC suitable for running windows 7, HDTV/Monitor, and Hardware accelerated video card such as the Intel integrated HD, nVidia, or ATI card. For lossless audio, only the Asus HDAV, the 57xx ATI cards, and the Intel H55 chipsets are supported.

Software: Total Media Theatre 3 recommended.

Recommended Formats: BD Folder structure (native format).

Popcorn hour (A-110, A-200)/HDX-1000/WD Live

Using network media players brings in a new dimension of both flexibility as well as complications. Specifically, these devices can stream most every format you can think of but they do not do them all equally well. For example, you can play MKV files but some devices may hang during navigation depending on the original format. This is mainly when the original is HD as some are encoded using VC-1 and some in H.264. VC-1 encoded files tend to hang on certain devices such as the Popcorn A-200 and have more issues in playback then do H.264 encoded files. They also do a great job playing .MT2S and .TS files but you lose chapter support on many of the devices. In addition, your content will have to be a single file format as the folder approach only works in some of the units but most do not work well using the native folder structure of DVD and BD, making it more challenging to have coexistence with WMC. Because of this, it becomes very difficult using network players sharing the same content with WMC. Windows Media Center is very comfortable working with DVD/BD folder structures, most network players prefer single file formats such as ISO and MKV. ISO support can be added to WMC however it is at times problematic as it requires third party add-ins.

Hardware: Network Player such as Popcorn Hour, HDX-1000, etc.

Software: No additional software required.

Recommended Formats: ISO, MKV, TS, MT2S, WMV

iPhone/iTouch/iPad

Let’s throw in more variables and say that you want to stream your content to your iTouch/iPhone/iPad or other mobile device. These devices do a great job in video playback once you get the content to them. Of course you can use various software to covert to the .MP4 format and copy them to the device but as space is limited, the real power comes from being able to stream either SD or HD content to your devices over the air either on 3G or Wi-Fi. There are a number of ways to do this but two of the more popular ways I have tried are ORB and Air Video. ORB requires that you create an account and connect to their server to stream the video.  In essence, you stream from your PC to their server and back to any mobile device. It works reasonably well and it allows you to connect with almost any device including a laptop. It crudely works with folder support (video_ts) but cannot handle any HD content. “StreamToMe” and “Air Video” are both iPhone/iPad applications that work extremely well in streaming directly from a local PC that is connected to your server to your portable device. The PC/MAC is used for real-time transcoding and basically pulls content from your server (or other location) and streams it across your broadband connection. If it is a MP4 format it will stream natively without the need to convert the format or if it is for example, an MKV, it will transcode the format real time as it streams it to you. I have tested the transcoding on both a SD DVD as well as a BD (40gig) uncompressed MKV file and it all worked perfectly. The quality is based on your bandwidth but when I was connected to Wi-Fi, the quality of the HD playback on my iPad was amazing. The down side is it does not support the folder structure of DVD (video_ts) or the Blu-Ray folder structure so you have to put your files in an MKV or WM* format in order to use them.  This forces you in most cases to have two copies of your content if you want to stream them to your portable device.  Both Air Video and StreamToMe are very similar in features, however I found Air Video to be more robust and more configurable.

Hardware: Any Windows 7 Compatible PC. A dual core system is recommended due to the real time transcoding.

Software: Air Video App and Server or StreamToMe app and server.

Recommended Formats:  MKV, WMV, AVI

Summary

It must be obvious by now that things are not ideal. It is very challenging to just pick one format and have it work effectively on everything. As I stated earlier there are some choices to make and that the video streaming world is not entirely perfect. Many times it may even require two versions of your content to do it effectively and cover all your devices. There are ways in which you can for example use MKV and play across all these devices, however as you get to HD content things get pretty ugly with the use of codecs as well as inconsistency in movie navigation.  I am not saying it cannot be done, only that you should expect compatibility problems if you have to resort to using third party codecs.  This is by no means a comprehensive list options you have and I have only touched the surface of the variables. I have tried to stick to the use of only mainstream software and native support. The moral here is that you should plan what devices you are going to use not because of their compatibility with different file formats, but rather their compatibility to each other. Some thought up front might save much in the way of work as well as aggravation. For example, it may not make sense to add a network player if you already have one or two HTPC’s as the price of something like a Acer Revo which is not much more than many network players and will save a much aggravation especially if all your content is folder structure. Although everyone is different, for me I end up with a dual approach. I use DVD/HD folder structure for use with only HTPC which replaced my network players, and create MKV formats in a different folder for streaming to my iPhone/iPad. This is certainly a separate step and not ideal, however it works very well and the results are outstanding. As a side note, if your movie content is in folder structure format, it is very quick to make an MKV from it and can be done directly from the folder. In closing do your homework, avoid mixing too many devices, and think out your strategy as sometimes saving a little money on hardware upfront can result in much aggravation.

My goal was to be able to play my entire DVD movie collection as well being able to playback my Blu Ray movies in their native video and audio formats including the ability to pass through lossless audio to my AV receiver.  It goes without saying I wanted to do this without ever leaving the 10 ft experience of WMC or without the use of a keyboard.

Suffice it to say that reaching my goal was not as easy as it should have been and that most of the products targeted to do this do not work as you would expect them to requiring additional add-ons and workarounds.  To set the baseline reference, my expectation was to use software suitable for the mass market that was easy to install, easy to use, played my Blu Ray content with lossless audio, and do it all without leaving the media center interface.  Sounds simple enough…

Staying true to my objective, I first started with the latest version of PowerDVD 9 Ultra which makes claims of Media Center integration, Blu Ray playback, and lossless audio pass-through via HDMI 1.3 support with a compatible sound card.  First problem I ran into is the trial version did not support Blu Ray playback at all so I was forced to buy the software to properly test it.  It did not take very long to figure out that PowerDVD was not going to work as it has one blaring issue that I could not live with and that it would not play any of my Blu Ray rips that where  stored on WHS or any hard drive for that matter.  It forced you to have a Blu Ray player or to use a work around such as Daemon Tools or Slysoft virtual drive and mount an ISO which I did not want to do as I was looking for a solution that was more flexible and did not force me into additional third party software.  The same problem existed with WinDVD 2010 but it was far more problematic and found it to be somewhat unstable.  It was prone to crash easily so I quickly tossed that one out as well.   Neither of these programs impressed me with their WMC integration but where decent as a PC based player, however that was not what I was looking for.  As a last ditch effort for the ultimate solution I decided to try Arcsoft’s Total Media Theatre 3 as I had read some reviews and heard good things about it.

Before I get into how well TMT 3 really works, let me talk about the type media I want to play,  the formats, and a little about the hardware I use.  Since WMC plays DVD’s natively as well as “most” media files, the first and most important to me was Blu Ray playback.  I use BD folders not ISO’s (using TsMuxer and AnyDVD HD) as well as single file MT2S and periodically MKV files (more on ripping in a future update as that is a post all by itself).  All of my BR rips contain only the core movie (all trailers and menus removed) and only the lossless audio track (TrueHD and DTS-HD) with all the other sound tracks removed.  I run two HTPC’s (see configuration below for reference) one has an HDMI Asus pass-through audio card which is attached to an AV receiver and the other feeds a sound bar setup using a TOSLINK optical cable.

Installing TMT 3 was quick and painless with no real surprises.  After a quick reboot I was prompted there was an update and installed it and again another reboot.  I went to my movie listing in WMC where both DVD and Blu Ray movies appeared in one listing and selected a Blu Ray film to see if TMT would live up to my expectations.  The minute I clicked the remote, I saw a TMT3 screen for about 3 seconds and then the Blu Ray movie began to play.

All the controls worked via my HTPC remote including chapter skip/back.  Playback was smooth (providing you use hardware acceleration), however I noticed that the color of the output seemed a bit dark for my taste.  This was noticeable on both ATI cards and nVidia based card I used for testing (GT 240, and ATI 5750).  I found that by default the video driver on both these cards is set to let the video player handle the settings but for some reason the default settings appear dark on TMT 3.  I am sure that TMT 3 is set to a truer theatrical setting that has been tuned for more of a dim lit/dark room.  However for my environment and taste it was simply too dark.  When I changed the setting to “manual” in my video card setup I was able to tune it perfectly for my needs and the settings had no effect on any other function in WMC including standard DVD playback.

The next thing I noticed is that TMT3 by default was down mixing the sound track and I was not getting the TrueHD and DTS-HD that I wanted to my receiver despite having all the recommended and supported hardware.  I checked the sound settings in TMT 3′s plug in and found the default settings to be incorrect for my configuration and changed the audio setting to HDMI pass through.  I went back to the movie to try out the setting and finally saw the words I wanted to see on my AV receiver “DTS-HD”.  Once it was setup correctly, every movie I have tossed at it has played perfectly and both TrueHD and DTS-HD have all worked with a hitch whether they were native 5.1 or 7.1.

After spending the last few months with TMT 3 I find this is a pretty awesome program and is the only 100% solution that I have found that plays BR movies directly from your WHS without any additional software or workarounds as well as supporting both types lossless audio.  Once you set it up for your HDTV and tune your video settings to your liking, you will not have to hit the keyboard again while sitting on your couch and you will be able to play your Blu Ray movies (providing they are in a “Blu Ray Folder” configuration so that they show in WMC listing) from within WMC.  MKV, M2TS and other single file formats play in the PC  player (See note below).  However only a BD structure shows up properly in windows media center and provides for full menu and chapter support.  I realize that everyone has their own way or ripping, has their preference of formats/containers, and may use numerous add-ons/workarounds to play their HD content.  I have tried most of those and to me having a straightforward playback solution which which pulls movies from my WHS without the use of a media server and integrates cleanly into Windows Media Center is the only way to go.  In my opinion there simply isn’t a better solution out there that supports the latest hardware all in one package.  They offer a trial version so anyone looking for a great solution for Blu Ray playback can give it a try.

Trial Version

http://www.arcsoft.com/en-us/software_title.asp?ProductCode=TMT3P&dyContent=DOWNLOAD_TYPE_0#submenu

Note:

Although TMT 3 normally supports MKV formats in PC playback, the latest update temporarily broke MKV compatibility.  Arcsoft is aware of the issue and there is a beta patch that addresses the issue.  Also, they added support for ATI 57XX series cards as well as Clarkdale and Ironlake motherboards.  I have not tested these features but will update when I do.  If you have TMT3 you can find the beta at the link below.

http://www.arcsoft.com/downloads/digitaltheatre/arcsoft/totalmediatheatre_beta_3.0.1.120_3.0.1.170_update_all.exe

Reference

Power DVD 9
http://www.cyberlink.com/products/powerdvd/overview_en_US.html

WinDVD 2010
http://www.corel.com/servlet/Satellite/us/en/Product/1189528458632#versionTabview=tab1&tabview=tab0

Arcsoft Total Media Theatre 3
http://www.arcsoft.com/estore/software_title.asp?ProductCode=TMT3P

Hardware Setup

HTPC #1

Core 2 6400
Gigabyte 965P-DS3
EVGA GTS 240 with HDMI to Sony 50 inch Plasma
2 Gigs of DDR2
60 Gig OCZ Agility SSD
Lite-On Blu Ray Reader
Asus HDAV Slim
Thermaltake 600W
Windows 7 Home (Media Center)

HTPC #2

Core 2 6400
Gigabyte P35-DS3L
EVGA 9600 with DVI
3 Gigs of DDR2
500 Gig Western Digital
Lite-On Blu Ray Reader
Thermaltake 600W
Windows 7 Home (Media Center)

Imagine sitting on your couch while watching TV, and being able to check sports scores, weather, read email, or even look up movie times, all without having to get up from the couch to go to the computer. The evolution 5500 universal remote control makes this possible using new Windows SideShow technology. The 4.3” color touch LCD gives you full control over your home entertainment system, lighting and HVAC, and your mobile PC or desktop computer. The Microsoft Green Button also gives you direct control over your digital entertainment library on your Windows 7 computer through the Windows Media Center.

Here are the specs:

• 4.3” LCD (480 x 272) with Touch
• Energy Efficient ARM926EJ-S 400 MHz Micro-Processor
• 1 GB NAND Flash Memory
• 256 MB DDR SDRAM
• 802.11g SDIO Llow Power Consumption Wi-Fi
• 3 Axis Motion Sensor
• Ambient Light Sensor
• Capacitive Buttons
• 5-Way Built-In Navigation Hard Keys
• Stylus Pen
• Windows Embedded CE 6.0 R2
• Wireless Streaming Content
• Microsoft Media Center Green Button
• Supporting 100 Devices
• Activity & Advanced Learning Function
• Home Automation Lighting and Curtain Control
• Rechargeable 3760 mAh Dual Cell Battery
• Firmware upgrade
• USB Charging
• Built in Mono Speaker and Microphone
• Z-Wave
• RC6
• Photo sync from Live.com

It can be purchased now for $799 during it’s beta test program.  Retail cost is $1299 and it expects to ship in April 2010.

You can learn more about the evolution 5500 here.

There is a video on the CES 2010 link that shows all the boxes.  I also got word that they will have an 8 tuner box this year.  It will be mainly for large distribution of content, so your apartment buildings, etc., but I’m sure the enthusiast community will be all over it as soon as it is released.  No date or cost was mentioned.  Check out the photos below.

Entertainment 2.0 Episode 57 is out and I was fortunate enough to join Adam and Josh to discuss Media Center and Windows Home Server.  You can download the episode here. Thanks to Adam and Josh for interviewing me.  I enjoyed it.